SPRINGFIELD TOWNSHIP, Ohio — The Springfield Township community is coming together to support the family of an 11-year-old boy who drowned in Lake Erie over the weekend.
Hunter Ebie was a football player for the Spartan Youth Football and Cheer league. The organization is teaming with Uncle Tito's Mexican Grill to host a fundraiser for Hunter's family.
"It's really important for us as parents and as board members and for the kids to help support Hunter's family right now, because they were a big part of the community, too,” Dustin Halterman, president of Spartan Youth Football and Cheer, said.
According to Uncle Tito's owner Fernando Leon, 33% of sales at the restaurant's Springfield location this coming Monday will be donated to the Ebie family. Leon is a father of three who also coaches youth sports in the community.
"The kids I coach are his (Hunter's) same age, and I could only imagine if that was one of the kids that I coached, or my own kid, how I would feel at the moment," he told 3News. "That's why we decided to step up."
Leon says the restaurant will make an additional donation to Hunter's family on top of the money raised through sales on Monday.
"We genuinely want to help," he added. "Him and his family are in our prayers."
Organizers chose the date June 17 to honor Hunter, who wore the No. 17. His flag football team also has 17 with wings and a halo printed on the sleeve of the shirts they wear during games.
"We've lost a really bright kid," Halterman said. "He was very fun-loving, he was very energetic, but he was a very kind young man."
Halterman's 11-year-old son Jonathan, who was Hunter's teammate, is encouraging people to participate in Monday's fundraiser.
"They're going through a rough time right now," Jonathan says of Hunter's family. "They're going to be really sad that they know that they can't see him again."
Spartan Youth Football and Cheer will also donate a portion of concession sales from their final spring games at Schrop Intermediate School on Sunday, June 23. Additionally, a GoFundMe has been set up to support the Ebie family, already raising more than $13,000 as of Wednesday night.